Expat in the Land of Marmite

Sledgehammer Fantasies

TUESDAY: Lunch is a bakery-fresh granary breadcake with currently rare Haas avocado and mature cheddar flavoured with chilli powder, cumin, cayenne, and spring onion. I say "rare" because avocados are currently well over a pound each, so I can't justify treating myself too often. This particular one was only 69p, which is a bargain.

There have been so many news reports lately on the increase in urban crime, specifically of the violent sort. A range of factors are blamed for this rise: an expanded population and hence more crowded conditions, information overload, the failing economy, the widening gap between the haves and the have-nots, poor education, and impatient generations growing up with television as nanny and video games and the Internet as playmates.

But let's not forget one of the major causes of urban violence, particularly in the case of normally peace-loving citizens who suddenly snap and lash out, even going so far as to shoot up a post office or a McDonald's. I'm talking, of course, about faulty alarms. After being kept awake all night by a wailing and whooping car alarm set off by nothing more than a passing cat, who hasn't had fantasies of taking sledge hammer in hand and going forth into the street and smashing said wailing and whooping car into oblivion? And if, after the former vehicle is no longer recognisable as a three-dimensional object, the alarm still insists on blaring, then nobody on the street is safe from the sledgehammer wielder's completely justifiable rage.

Let's start with the most basic of alarm nuisances: the poorly placed smoke detector. I thought the single detector in my rented Seattle house was inconvenient enough, because every time we boiled water or opened a jar of Marmite we would have to throw a tea towel over the infernal thing. But I had yet to experience the home I currently rent in Sheffield. The landlord seems like a nice normal guy, aside from being an obsessive pyrophobe, as there are no less than 5 smoke detectors in our very cosy 3-story terrace house. That means there are 3 detectors on one floor alone. And of course all but one are situated on the high ceilings in impossible-to-reach locations, and they're all wired into the mains so we can't unplug them. Whenever one of us dares to turn on the cooker, Horace -- as we fondly call the detector at the top of the main stairs -- starts beeping away; and if one of us doesn't drop whatever we're doing and charge up the stairs to push Horace's snooze button, the rest of the detectors soon join in with a terrifying chorus of "BEEPBEEP! BEEPBEEP! GET OUT FAST! FIRE! FIRE! THE SKY IS FALLING! THE SKY IS FALLING!"

At least the only nervous wrecks the paranoid smoke detector creates are the building's inhabitants. The detector's big brother, the car alarm, has the power to turn an entire neighbourhood into a posse of screaming vigilantes. One afternoon years ago in Seattle when I was working at home, I was so engrossed in my computer that it took me probably a good hour to notice the whee-ooh-whee-ooh-ing of a nearby car alarm. As this was late in the afternoon when people are coming and going I figured the alarm would either turn itself off or its owner would arrive home from work and disconnect it. After another 2 hours my nerves were ravaged to such an extreme that my body had become one massive facial tic. After another half hour I quickly scrawled an angry note with my shaking hand and stomped outside in search of the offending car. I had intended to tap my note to the windscreen; but quite a few other neighbours had got there before me, as the windscreen was plastered in notes, some polite but firm and some satisfyingly obscene. Like a war veteran placing a wreath on a memorial I solemnly and proudly added my note to the angry collage.

What prompted me to write about alarms is the fact that I had very little sleep last night. In my dreams I kept hearing a chorus of birds warbling. When, at 1:00am, I finally became conscious, I realised the warbling was much too regular and mechanical to have been produced by living things, and I gradually realised it was a house alarm from just down the road. As there was no variation to the pitch or tempo I found it impossible to fall back into Slumberland. By the time I arose at 7:00 the alarm was still warbling loudly and strongly in perfect time with my gnashing teeth.

It really makes me wonder: is the potential reduction in car thefts and house burglaries really worth the increase in gross violence inflicted on car and house owners? It doesn't make much sense to me. But then I'm feeling pretty sleep-deprived at the moment.

25.7.08 11:12